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Episode 9:
The Beast
“WHAT’S…HAPPENING?” LUDORIC RASPED.
There was a sudden burst of golden light from the castle they were heading toward. The light was beautiful, but they could not stop trembling in the face of the ominous presence that came with it.
“Wh-what is this feeling?” Noel’s voice quivered.
“Your Highness!” The three paladins were with them now, having managed to cleanse themselves of the poison and join the two boys along the way. They also looked to be unnerved by the light. “You mustn’t go, Your Highness. You mustn’t get involved.”
“How can you say such a thing?!” Ludoric snapped.
Е̄ nům а.і̆d̂
Since the paladins could use holy magic, they could more easily sense the evil of that light. Yet that was the very reason that Ludoric could not turn a blind eye to it.
“Have you forgotten your duty?! Yes, you’re here for my protection, but you also have an obligation to protect the Princess of the Holy Kingdom and the Saint, Yulucia! You call yourselves proud knights of the Holy Kingdom who smite evil?!”
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“Please forgive us.”
What was even the point of apologizing? Ludoric was right that it was indeed their duty as paladins to go and rescue Yulucia. Nevertheless, protecting Ludoric was their priority.
“We shall go to save Her Highness. You and Lord Noel should remain here.”
“Out of the question! I will spare no effort to rescue her. And—”
Ēn̆u m а̂ . і́.d
“I agree. I am also coming along,” Noel said.
The man acting as the leader of the paladins looked into the two boys’ eyes, finding them full of determination. He nodded with a soft sigh of resignation. “We will rescue Her Highness, even if it costs us our lives. However, should we encounter true peril, will you please trust us and withdraw?”
“Fine,” Ludoric agreed, though he would most likely refuse to flee.
Still, the paladins were moved by the boys’ tenacity.
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“Let’s go!” Ludoric called.
“Yes, Your Highness!” the three paladins replied.
Ѐ n̈ů m̆ а
With the swords taken from their assailants in hand, Ludoric led the paladins toward the castle.
Noel was in the rear, reeling from the sense of déjà vu he felt when he saw the color of the golden light that reached the sky. “That light… It couldn’t be.”
***
“Ooh, we did it.” Isabella’s breath caught and she felt tingly all over at the sight of its mighty yet beautiful form.
It was so unnerving and gave her such a chill that she had goosebumps all over her body, so intense that she thought she might pass out or try to flee. Nevertheless, as the daughter of a family of spies and assassins, Isabella had the force of will to endure—it was because of what she knew that she was able to withstand her fear.
Archbishop Callisto said it was a messenger of the gods. They were unable to summon an actual almighty god, but they would be capable of communicating with one of their messengers.
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Caudle said it was something like an elemental that had been called a god and then sealed away. That they could bind it to the magic circle and then use its powers for their own purposes.
She hadn’t known it would materialize here, but she was filled with exaltation since she believed that she was about to achieve what she desired.
Even though Liasteia was the daughter of a viscount just like her, Liasteia had gotten a prince to fall in love with her at first sight and was now a part of the royal family, having been named the Grand Duke of Versenia’s first wife. Isabella had used Liasteia’s daughter as a sacrifice so that she herself could become queen and her own daughter a princess. If anyone had heard her ambitions, they would have likely scoffed. However, Isabella had assumed she would be trapped as a third wife in a loveless marriage of convenience just to keep the ties between her family and House Capell, so this had been worth staking her life on. She believed that she would find happiness at the top of society.
She still had not heard word that her men had managed to capture Ludoric. But no matter; that drug could not be easily cured even with holy magic. She was certain that they would catch him right away. Even if Ludoric himself wound up realizing that he had been drugged and refused to marry Cordelia, she figured she could simply use the daemon’s dark magic spell Charm to convince him.
“Hee hee.” It was starting to sink in that this was all really happening. Isabella’s life was truly just about to begin.
And for that, she had to take the first step to making it happen. Isabella mustered all of her courage to take up the role of the being’s mistress and give it an order, readying herself for a step forward. But that was when…
Е̄ n̄ū m а
“Oooooh, Goddess!” Callisto staggered forward, tears streaming down his face.
Callisto wished for world peace. He was unable to contain his emotional tears at beholding a great being with power to control the foolish masses.
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The being of golden light was more beautiful than anything Callisto could have imagined. The fact that she looked like a beast and not a human meant that she was a divine beast—a messenger of the gods who had transcended the human species—and the overflowing power coming from her was doubtless proof of that in his mind.
He attributed his fear and trembling to his awe in the presence of such a great being, and there was no hesitation in Callisto as he reached out his hand. “O Goddess—”
Starting at the fingertips of his outstretched hand, Callisto’s body hardened and turned black. Callisto had a look of ecstasy on his face as his body corroded away and he crumbled to the ground in pieces.
There was a moment of silence.
W ë bñ о̌v̄ е̊ l Е̄_n̈ ü m̀á.
“Eek!” Isabella had just been about to step forward as well, but she let out a muffled cry and tumbled backward to get away. And that…
That action—the extreme terror rising up within Isabella—was enough to arouse the interest of the Golden Beast, who had not moved at all until that moment.
“Someone heeeeeeeeeeelp!”
Isabella was overtaken from behind by the golden light. Crimson claws ripped through her, fresh blood splattering as Isabella fell and the Golden Beast crashed down on her back.
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“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”
What had she done wrong? What line had she crossed that she shouldn’t have?
W еb̈ ňо̄ vél̂ Е̄ ǹu̇m а
She was sure she hadn’t done anything wrong at all.
Every action she had taken was what any superior person would have done to obtain everything they were owed. And yet…
Blood and cries of agony gushed from her mouth as she asked herself where she had gone wrong. She had no idea just what she had gotten involved in as all of her loyal servants met a grisly death, flooded with a massive amount of miasma that made them decompose into dust.
“To think that we would manage to summon the Beast!” Daemon General Caudle of the Daemon King’s army shuddered as he watched the golden sparkling beast that had devoured the Saint’s magic powers.
Caudle was a warrior, and he wished that he could have battled the humans head-on and even clashed with the true Hero. However, the compassionate Daemon King whom he loved and respected didn’t want the power to defeat the humans, but to summon a special kind of asset: a great being that would enable the daemons to steal the world for themselves, so that their kind wouldn’t have to die.
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This was a demon from another dimension. It had lived such a very long time that those with limited lifespans, such as him, would call it an eternity.
A single arch demon was powerful enough to bring calamity to an entire nation, and as those arch demons devoured one another, three kinds of Master Class Demons had emerged: the Demon Lord, the Beast, and the Devil. A Master Class Demon’s power was equal to that of a god, and so long as the daemons could acquire the power of one of them, they should be able to save their kind. However, if they were unable to control the demon, and it was released into the world, then not only would the daemons perish, but the rest of the world may follow.
Without that power, though, there was no way to control the selfish daemons or greedy humans.
The Daemon King and Caudle had carefully planned and worked toward this for over ten years now. If a human nation had discovered that they were planning to summon such a dangerous being, then the humans would’ve likely set their differences aside to band together and eradicate the daemons.
Under normal circumstances, the Daemon King would never have considered trying to use such a dangerous being either. He had tried instead to use his own might to control the human nations through armed interference, teaching Caudle the concept of deterrence.
In order to summon and control the demon, they had channeled massive amounts of magic into the enormous summoning circle underneath the Daemon King’s castle and, once they were ready, planned to use the hundreds of human sacrifices gathered by Caudle’s underlings to make a pact with the demon.
Е n ùm̂ ă
They had successfully drugged Yulucia to knock her out and then used the magic circle and a dark magic ritual to sap her magic. The circle had screamed at the quantity of magic that far surpassed what any human should possess, but that power should have been enough to make the Daemon King’s wish come true.
So why had the being they had been trying to summon manifested here and not the Daemon Lands?
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And completely unbound at that.
“This cannot be!” Caudle was confused. Why had the king of being that only existed in legends, myths, and historical documents appeared here? Could it be that because they had used Saint Yulucia’s magic, which was of the highest quality, it had materialized here in order to take her as a sacrifice?
He had kept Callisto and Isabella in the dark, and now the humans had died because they had carelessly attempted to contact the demon. No, it had preyed on them. They had become a predator’s meal.
The Golden Beast swallowed up something that must have been the souls of the dead humans and then casually floated up into the air with the giant wings on her back.
Еǹ ŭ m а̇ .їd
“What the…?”
What was the Beast trying to do? Was she about to destroy the world? Bring about the downfall of all living things?
Caudle paled as he watched the Beast look out into the distance and narrow her crimson eyes.
The north. That was where the Daemon Lands were. The Saint probably hadn’t been enough of a sacrifice for the Golden Beast and now she was going to go after the magic they had sent to the Daemon Lands.
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“Ugh… Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” Caudle let out a roar to shake off his fear and unsheathed his sword to slash at the Beast.
“Lord Caudle?!”
Ẽ ň_um̀ ӑ_
“We need to get its attention! We can’t let it go to the Daemon King!”
Caudle’s underlings voiced their confusion as he cast off his human disguise, revealing his true form as an ashen-skinned daemon, and attacked the Beast. He was too deep in his panic to care about disguises or plans.
Everything would be over if the Beast managed to reach the Daemon Lands. If something were to happen to the Daemon King, then the daemons had no future.
“Understood. We will sacrifice ourselves for the Daemon King.” Caudle’s men sensed something in his spirit, and they too threw off their human disguises and unsheathed their hidden weapons.
Daemon was the general term for the people who had been banished to the northern lands. After generations of mixing bloodlines—including with monstrosities—the daemons did not have any common trait other than their ashen skin. The men who had joined Caudle on this mission looked comparatively closer to humans in terms of their appearances and were rational enough to be able to live among humans. Though this made them valuable assets in the eyes of the selfish daemons, it also meant they weren’t all that strong in battle.
“I’m sorry to ask this of you.” Caudle couldn’t retreat. He knew they had no chance of winning. Or surviving. They just needed to get the attention of the Beast away from the Daemon Lands.
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In order to ensure that the daemons could survive.
“Let’s go!”
“Yaaaaaah!”
After trying so hard to suppress Yulucia’s power, Nia was now furious at the people who had so carelessly provoked her.
Why had Yulucia appeared in her true form? The only thing she could tell was that Yulucia wasn’t in her usual state of mind and was only acting on instinct.
There had been something mixed into the alcohol she drank, but drugs that worked on humans shouldn’t have affected a demon. The fact that it hadn’t worked on Nia and the other three was proof of that.
W е́ b n о́ v̌ е̊ l Е n̆ u̇m̀ǎ
Yulucia had calmed down a little bit after eating Isabella’s soul, so Nia considered seizing her chance to kill and collect the souls of the other humans in the area while Noah fired at their mistress to try to get her to snap back to herself, but Nia was afraid that plan might set Yulucia off and cause her to go on a violent rampage instead.
“Nia! Tina!”
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Having sensed something wrong with their mistress, Noah and Fanny had teleported in.
“Lady Yulucia?!”
“How is Mistress?! What’s happened?!”
“We don’t know, but she’s not herself right now! Nia’s got her under control for the moment, but we don’t know how long she’ll be able to hold her,” Tina explained, since Nia was completely focused on using her powers.
Wе b ṅȯvе̊ ĺ Е̂ nũ mа
Normally, Yulucia wouldn’t have been defeated, no matter who her opponent was. However, they feared that Yulucia might end up hurting even them in her present confused state.
“Lady Yulucia!”
“Wait!” Noah stopped Fanny before she could leap at Yulucia.
Sensing the powers of the arch demons, the Golden Beast vanished and Noah and Fanny were sent flying straight through the stone wall.
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“Nia!”
“I know!”
Е̂ ǹu m а̌. іd̊
At Tina’s shout, Nia unsheathed her black demonic blade and slashed through the eddy of magic, absorbing some of it, but her demonic blade shrieked in protest. Not even an arch demon like Nia was a match for that power.
Rooooooooooooooooooooooooooar!!!
The Golden Beast howled, knocking back Tina and Nia along with the magic they had been suppressing. That was when…
“Raaaaaaaaaaaah!” Caudle drove his long sword right at her, ready in the face of death. “Beast Magic Strike!!!”
Caudle was descended from a line that was predominantly beastfolk. He interwove the strength of his vitality and magic—gathering his fighting spirit—to unleash a powerful attack. The shock wave of it was enough to break the stone flooring and the blade of his demonic sword struck true against the Golden Beast. However…
“Wh—”
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The Golden Beast repelled his mighty attack with a snap of her wing. Caudle was stunned that the golden membrane didn’t have a single scratch on it. Her golden tail cracked like a whip at not only him but his men as well, cutting them all down around him.
“Gruuuuuuuuuuuugh?!”
The Golden Beast moved at such a speed that his eyes couldn’t track it. Caudle relied on the trace of gold he could see to block her with his long sword, handed down among those in the Daemon King’s castle.
However, a single flick of the Beast’s tail broke the powerful demonic sword and sliced through Caudle’s side as well. His severed left arm was knocked away along with the chunks of meat that had once been his men.
Daemon General Caudle was known not only in the Daemon Lands but the human nations as a mighty warrior, and here he had been swatted back in a single strike as if he were a fly.
“Nrrrgh…” Despite his lost arm and the gaping wound in his side, Caudle stood up with his broken demonic blade at the ready. “Damn it…”
Ӗnú ḿ а̀
“How dare he…!” Noah hissed at the fool who recklessly provoked the Golden Beast, flinging debris away as he stood up.
“Mistreeeess!” Debris scattered off Tina as she bolted forward, this time using not just magic but her physical abilities as an arch demon to try to immobilize the Golden Beast.
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“Tina!” Fanny cried as she came crawling out of the debris, just as the Golden Beast took a bite off Tina’s left shoulder at dreadful speed.
“Ahh!” Tina was momentarily petrified at having been attacked like this by her beloved mistress.
The Golden Beast swung a golden wing at Tina. Nia leapt out to block it with her black demonic blade, shouting Tina’s name, but both girls were thrown back.
“Koff… This sure isn’t easy.” Nia spat out a black clump the way a human would vomit blood. The attack had been enough to whittle away a part of her very being, and if it weren’t for her power to Absorb, she likely wouldn’t even have been able to speak anymore.
Ẅ е̌b nо̆v́.e ĺ Е ǹ u mа
But they weren’t out of danger yet.
“Here she comes!”
The Golden Beast’s form turned hazy—as if covered in mist—just before she attacked them at fearsome speed.
“Spaaarkle!” Fanny leapt out and used her nightmare glamour to avert the attack from the two of them.
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Rrrruuuumble!!!
The noise of the shock wave was deafening, whipping up a windstorm of such velocity that it blew away the outer walls of the castle like cotton candy.
Ё n̄ ŭm̊а̃ . i ď
“This is all so ridiculous.” Noah took the opportunity to retrieve the two girls and heal them with his powers of Release. He shuddered at the difference in their power, yet could not peel his eyes away from the Golden Beast. “Nia, Tina, can you still move?” he asked with a grave expression.
“Just barely.” Nia had not yet fully recovered from the exhaustion of trying to restrain Yulucia.
“I…can manage.” Tina was the one with the best combat skills out of all of them, and she looked at her mistress with fire in her eyes as she checked the feeling in her newly regenerated left arm. “I will endure our Mistress’s love.”
“Okay. Let’s do this,” Noah answered after a strange pause, then rushed toward the Golden Beast with the two girl demons following after him.
“Nia!”
“Got it!”
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Nia took the lead, taking Fanny’s place to block the Golden Beast’s attacks with her demonic blade.
Claaaang!
“Khgh!”
“Nia, I’ve got your back! Tina, attack her! Fanny, help her out!” Noah shouted.
Of course Nia would be their tank. She was the only one who could withstand the Golden Beast’s blows. But in order to do that, she needed Noah to replenish whatever magic she lost.
Nia’s Absorb ability could convert an attack from an enemy into the corresponding amount of magic. However, if the attack was stronger than she could absorb, she would take considerable damage. But Noah could convert the small amount she was able to absorb into magic to heal with her with, and this was how Nia was able to just barely endure the onslaught.
Êǹ ū m̄ а
“Attack Mistress?! Have you gone mad?!” Tina asked Noah. Out of their designated roles of attacker, tank, and support, she was their attacker.
“Half-hearted attacks won’t even make her blink. We have to give her some kind of shock to try to get her to wake up again. It’s the only thing we can do!”
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Tina groaned in response and then turned toward her Mistress, baring her pitch-black fangs and claws.
“Here I go!” Tina cried out of desperation as she rushed forward and drove her magical attacks into the Golden Beast’s side just as their mistress was about to attack Nia.
Dooooooom!
There was a roaring sound like two enormous metal objects clashing. Tina lost to the impact and was repelled back.
En_ŭm.ӓ. і d
The deep crimson eyes whirled around to stare at Tina, sending a chill down her spine. The Golden Beast’s tail snapped at her like a whip, which Fanny managed to block using her glamour.
“Haaaaah!” Nia saw her chance to imbue the demonic blade with the magic she got from Noah and plunge it into the Golden Beast.
Krak!
The attack not only failed to so much as shake the Golden Beast, but despite being imbued with the magic of two arch demons, the tip of the blade broke off and shattered into pieces.
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Rooooooooooooooooooooooar! The Golden Beast bellowed, gathering an eddy of great power in her opened mouth.
“Block it!” Noah shrieked.
Ẃ е b n̈ ò vе̃_l̇ Ên u m̀а̂
Nia’s absorption powers and Fanny’s nightmares enveloped them all just as an enormous shock wave fired like a beam from the Golden Beast’s mouth, demolishing what remained of the castle into sand and carving into one of the mountains that could be seen in the distance.
***
“Get doooown!”
Ludoric instinctively obeyed the paladin’s shout just as a gale like that from an explosion powerful enough to uproot the thin trees in the area swept past them.
“Noel!”
“Khgh!”
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Although Noel was also on the ground, he was small and seemed on the verge of being blown away, so Ludoric reached out his hand to him. Noel immediately took the boy’s hand and used it to endure the impact.
“What was that?” Noel asked.
“Look there!” one of the paladins shouted.
The paladins had managed to withstand the force of the wind thanks to their heavy armor, but they were all stunned by what their comrade called their attention to.
“The castle…”
“That mountain’s just completely gone?!”
Ӗnŭ ma.іd̃
They had been heading toward the castle, yet not only had their destination completely vanished without a trace of its existence, one of the mountains in the distance had been gouged into and a colossal mushroom-shaped cloud of dust was rising up from it.
“What in the world?” Ludoric uttered weakly at the realization that something completely out of the ordinary had just happened.
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There was no way that whatever Duke Capell had been scheming would have reached this level. Knowing that this was now a crisis situation made the prince hesitate to step forward.
It wasn’t because he was afraid. Of course, he was afraid. But if something were to happen to him, not only would his guards have to take responsibility for it, but losing a member of the royal family would weaken the kingdom’s strength internationally and affect the entire nation.
“I have no intention of stopping here. If something were to happen to me, there’s always my brother. It’s my duty as a member of the royal family to save Yulucia and take care of this situation.”
“Right!” The paladins and Noel all nodded with determination at the prince’s declaration.
Ėnù m̌а̃
“Let’s go!”
***
“Is everyone okay?”
“I think so.”
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Noah emerged as he pushed the debris of the demolished castle off himself. The other three arch demons also emerged from the rubble unharmed, though their clothes were all torn.
As beings from the Ethereal World, the demons appeared fine, but the damage they had taken had depleted their stock of magic considerably.
W̌_еb̂ ňо́v̌ѐ l̂ E n̂u mа
“This is—”
“Mistress’s power.”
The Golden Beast was the Beast, the title of one of the Demon Realm’s most powerful demons.
Yulucia’s four attendants knew better than anyone else that Yulucia was of a much higher rank than they were. She was their creator, their mother, their older sister—their beloved mistress who was the shining sun of the Demon Realm.
The four arch demons had been summoned from the Demon Realm by Yulucia to serve her once again. While her true self was indeed powerful, they were aware that the magic they felt from her wasn’t all that different from their own after they had evolved into arch demons. They thought this the result of their desperate attempts to build up their strength in order to better serve her, and were overjoyed from the bottoms of their hearts that they were able to use their power for her sake and that she needed their powers as well.
But they had been wrong.
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Yulucia had once called them demons with no redeeming features. They had no special abilities—the only thing they had going for them was their speed. But that was only in terms of their abilities. In seeing her true self manifest with her fangs bared, the four demons realized just how much of a gulf there was between themselves and their mistress in terms of power.
Thinking back, they should have known from their time with her in the Demon Realm.
There was a demon Yulucia only referred to as him, and while he was mighty, she had never seemed bothered by the intensity of his presence. And once, when she had wielded her power, it had been enough to make the very ground of the Demon Realm quake.
Likely, top-ranking demons were able to hide their power, but where did they hide it? High-ranking demons could create an intrinsic pocket dimension within their souls. They could sever their power, which far surpassed that of any arch demon, and tuck it away in there.
They had assumed that Yulucia didn’t have her own intrinsic pocket dimension, but after witnessing the Golden Beast’s power, her attendants at last knew the truth: The Golden Beast—Yulucia’s true form—had lost her magic when she forced her way through that gate to the Material World, and until now had been sleeping deep inside Yulucia’s soul.
Meaning that Yulucia had been completely unable to use any of her demonic powers until she had consumed her first soul. Which only made sense. It was impossible to recover enough power to destroy a world on human meals alone. Since then, she had been slowly recovering some of her power through offerings, but had yet to recover her true strength.
W̃ е̇ b̃.n ӧ v еl Е̌ň ǔm a
Once she had her four attendants, though, she had been able to consume souls more regularly, and that magic flowed into her slumbering true self as well.
That power of her true form could no longer be contained within her intrinsic pocket dimension and had increased so significantly that it wouldn’t have been surprising if it burst out from inside of her soul at one point or another. The daemons’ evil designs to draw out her magic had instead dragged out her true form—starving from hunger—from the depths of her soul.
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“Keep focused!” Noah said.
The Golden Beast had noticed that the arch demons were still alive. She flapped her golden wings as she gazed down at them with her crimson eyes from high in the sky.
Having used her power, she was probably starting to feel hungry. The Golden Beast peered at the demons with their masses of magic like they were her prey and swooped down at them while they were still paralyzed by the degree of difference in their powers. That was when…
“Are you all right?!”
Ѐnu̇ m̂ а̄
Noah grimaced at the sound of the distant voice.
Ludoric and Noel were rushing straight for them. They did not balk at the sight of the terrible spectacle and had even brought the three paladins along.
“Why are you here?!” Noah shouted, not bothering to hide his irritation. While he had no personal concern for their well-being, Yulucia had ordered them to ensure their safety, so he had to make sure that Yulucia didn’t accidentally kill them.
“Now’s not the time to worry about me!” Ludoric shouted back.
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The paladins raised an eyebrow at Noah’s disrespectful attitude, but since Ludoric didn’t seem to care, they judged that Noah must have had a similar relationship to the prince as Noel.
“Don’t get distracted!” Noel glared at the Golden Beast, sword drawn and at the ready.
Е̂ nu mа̇..і̀ d̂
“What—? What is that?” Ludoric and the paladins felt a chill run down their spines.
The creature appeared to be a small leopard with golden fur and wings, yet her beauty belied the undeniable reality of the frightening level of power that they could sense from a single look.
“Noah? Where’s Yulucia?” Ludoric asked.
“Uh…” Noah stumbled at the question.
Sensing something in Noah’s hesitation, Ludoric’s gaze snapped toward the Golden Beast in the sky with a sudden realization.
“Brace yourselves!” Noel shouted out again just as the Golden Beast pounced at them. Noel readied his sword to take the blow, but—
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“Haaah!” Nia intercepted using her demonic blade as a shield, but was flung back and slammed into the rubble.
“Nia!” Noel cried out with fright.
Before he could even turn his head to look back at her, Noah and Fanny grabbed the humans, pushing them away just as Tina hurled herself at the Golden Beast to prevent her from chasing after them.
“Stay back!” Noah dumped Ludoric and Noel unceremoniously on the ground.
“How are you able to withstand that?” Ludoric asked Noah.
“Now is not the time,” Noah replied.
Е̃ṅ um̌ a .i d̊
As the prince stood back up again, he noticed the stunned look on Noel’s face. “What’s wrong?”
“Do you recognize that golden glow?” Noel asked.
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“Huh?” Ludoric scowled as he tried to make the connection.
Noah’s lips curled. These two boys Yulucia was close with were on the verge of figuring out the truth.
The beast was the same golden color as Yulucia. She was gone and that creature was here now—what would they think it meant?
“Hear me, humans!” Caudle shouted. Just barely hanging onto life by a thread, he pointed his broken demonic blade at them with his remaining right arm. He had only managed to survive the destruction because he had been fortunate enough to be standing behind the barrier the four arch demons had erected.
Ѐ nú m̀_ӓ.іḋ
“Listen closely to what I say! That there is a high-ranking demon from the Demon Realm! She’s going to destroy the world if we don’t do something! If you don’t want to die, then fight with me!!!”
Daemons couldn’t use holy magic. Instead, they could heal themselves by using dark magic spells like Wounds to give their injuries to someone else. At present, though, Caudle had something that looked like a black miasma clinging to his injured left shoulder and side, eating away at him like a curse.
The man already had one foot in the grave, yet his dedication and loyalty to the Daemon King kept him going. He now felt a faint glimmer of hope in the humans who were somehow managing to put up a fight against the powerful demon he had accidentally summoned.
He had to prevent that monster from reaching the Daemon King no matter what. That sense of duty was the only thing keeping him alive now.
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Ludoric was shocked by Caudle’s now-ashen skin. “That color—are you a daemon?!”
Caudle looked toward them in answer. “I am Daemon General Caudle of the Daemon King’s Army! If the Beast is allowed to run free, it would be perilous for not just this kingdom, but the entire world! Forget what I am and help me!”
W̃е b̌ ṅo v̈ е̌l Еn̆.u m ǎ
“What?! Don’t tell me that this is all your—”
“Ludoric, wait!” Noel stopped Ludoric from running his mouth and pointed his sword at Caudle as he looked up at the Golden Beast in the sky with something like hatred in his eyes. “Then that means that beast really is—”
Ludoric finally began to understand what Noel had been trying to tell him and shuddered. “No.”
Yulucia was gone.
And instead, there was a beast with the same coloring as Yulucia.
The four demons fell silent, welling up with the desire to kill these humans who had figured out the truth.
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Their masquerading as humans was over. Their mistress would probably punish them for it later, but to protect Yulucia’s dream of living in a human world, they were now resolved to kill all of the humans here without leaving even a trace of their souls behind. They were just about to reveal their own true forms when—
“You mean to say that monster’s glowing like that because it absorbed Yulucia?!” Ludoric cried out.
“Yes, I think they used Lucia as a sacrifice to summon that beast. I can’t believe they would do such an awful thing!” Noel answered.
“Now do you understand, kids?! The Beast has grown even stronger by absorbing the Saint’s magic! That golden glow is your proof!” Caudle confirmed their conclusion.
Hearing all of this, Noah’s shoulders relaxed.
They all thought so highly of her that not even Caudle—their enemy—doubted Yulucia’s saintly purity. It would never even occur to them that Yulucia was involved with demons.
Е̇ ň üm̄ ӓ. i ď
“Uh, that’s right.” Noah felt so exhausted after that, he could only give a listless answer.
‹Noah.› That was when Noah heard Fanny speak to him telepathically. She was busy with their mistress at present.
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‹What is it?›
‹I think there’s something wrong with Lady Yulucia.›
‹What?!› When he took a good look at her, he realized something strange.
Nia hadn’t taken any damage and was back on the front lines. Even Tina and Fanny looked like they were having an easier time.
Wеḃńó v е̌l E n̊um̆а̊
Could it be—? Ah! Noah’s mind whirled and he instantly arrived at an answer.
Why were the humans unharmed even though they were so close to the Golden Beast as she wielded her immense power? The moment after she’d manifested, the miasma she emitted had been enough to rot the scheming humans away, and she’d gobbled them up along with their very souls. But now the Golden Beast wasn’t giving off any miasma at all.
Although the Golden Beast grew stronger from eating the black souls of Isabella and the daemons, no important human had died. This phenomenon was—
It must be because humans Mistress cares about are here.
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Which meant that a part of Yulucia’s consciousness still remained. Likely, she unconsciously didn’t register Ludoric, Noel, and the others as prey.
Same went for Noah and the other arch demons. Although they were all barely hanging on, the four of them would likely be dead already if she had attacked them with her full strength and speed. But each time, the Golden Beast had pulled back at the very last moment, giving the demons a chance to survive.
Ê n̈ ũ_ṁ а .і̂ d̊
Even Caudle had managed to survive that torrent of power because he had been behind Noah and the others.
The four demons were moved that their mistress still had unconscious compassion toward them even in her current state. Meanwhile, Ludoric and the other humans continued bickering with Caudle, so Noah pleasantly interjected like the trickster he was and simply said, “Leave this to us. We have a good idea of how to handle this.”
“Let’s do it!”
“Yes, Your Highness!” the three paladins responded in unison to Ludoric’s command and began to move.
However, it was not Ludoric or any of the paladins leading the charge, but Nia, the girl knight who was still only twelve years old.
The paladins frowned at the idea of having to fight behind the pretty little girl at first, but she had been fending off the Golden Beast’s attacks the entire time they were talking, and they had had no choice but to accept the attendant’s strength, believing that she had the divine protection of the Saint.
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“We’re going to get Yulucia back!”
Noah’s proposed plan wasn’t anything unusual. They were to give their mistress such a shock that it rattled her, as the four demons had been attempting to do the whole time—though before, they had been trying to specifically bring Yulucia back to her senses. Now they were trying something different.
“I want you all to keep attacking as hard as you can. When we see our opening, we will sever Lady Yulucia from the creature!” Noah’s words gave the humans hope as they charged the Golden Beast.
Up until then, the four attendants had assumed that Yulucia’s consciousness had been devoured by her real demonic nature, but assuming she still unconsciously cared for Ludoric and the other humans, then there was a chance that they could seal her true form away again.
Yulucia didn’t have her own intrinsic pocket dimension. That was why she had unconsciously avoided destroying the World of Light she so yearned for when she first arrived in the Material World in her oversized true form. Accidentally using up all of her true form’s magic must have been the reason she had been reborn as a human.
The reason the Golden Beast was going on such a rampage now must have been because her true form’s magic was far too great for the current Yulucia to control. With time, she would have acclimated to it, but to leave such magical powers unchecked would likely turn the entire world against her.
W е́ b̃no.v̆ е l̂ E n ǔ mа̌
And so, Noah and the others planned to seal her true form into a new intrinsic pocket dimension for Yulucia’s usage.
Could they make such a thing so easily, though? They had an idea for how to pull it off.
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Since they’d arrived in the Material World, the four arch demons had been slowly gathering up Yulucia’s surplus of magic to create an intrinsic pocket dimension for her in a Demon Realm they called Lost Eden.
Their plan was to seal Yulucia’s true body in Lost Eden and stabilize her by officially making it her intrinsic pocket dimension. And so, all of the arch demons other than Nia set about making a giant magic circle in the ruins of the castle to prepare.
They couldn’t afford to split up any further if they were going to seal their mistress’s powers away. They had no choice but to assign Nia to protect the humans so that they didn’t accidentally die.
That being the case, who would make the attack to rattle the Golden Beast?
Еn ŭ m а̇ ..í d̆
“Don’t lag behind, human!”
“You don’t need to tell me!”
Even as they bickered, Caudle and Noel engaged the Golden Beast with their swords. The two of them were strong, but their lifespans were limited. Alone, their powers could not even hope to match that of an arch demon, let alone a greater demon.
Still, Noel and Ludoric were Yulucia’s close friends and a single strike from one of them was sure to rattle her heart more than any more powerful blow ever could.
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Roaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar!
The Golden Beast snarled threateningly at the puny creatures attacking her and pounced. Nia blocked her, parrying the attack with all her might.
W ѐb̆.n о̄.v̀еl. .Е̃ n ũ m̆ ӓ
“Now!” The one-armed Caudle charged in, putting his whole body into swinging his broken demonic blade.
A golden wing repelled the attack, so Noel dove in to fill the gap and swung. Her long tail parried his sword, smacking both him and the sword away.
“I’m not finished yet!” Noel had not yet been defeated. He dug his heels into the ground before charging into the battle again.
The Golden Beast began to move to face him, but Nia blocked the attack.
“This way, beast!”
“Heal Lord Noel!”
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Caudle was afflicted by the miasma and Nia had been hit by multiple miasma attacks already, but they both refused healing, knowing holy magic wouldn’t be as effective on them. As a result, the paladins gave Nia backup as she single-handedly fought off each attack and healed Noel with their magic so that one person didn’t have to shoulder all of the burden.
“These are humans?” The lone daemon among all of these humans, Caudle was astonished by their strength.
Daemons were physically superior from the beastfolk and monstrosity blood running through their veins. The other humanoid species—humans being the most numerous—couldn’t hope to compare in terms of physical strength. However, humans were capable of combining their strength and fighting together. They could band together and fight for a common cause, unlike daemons, who lived in packs formed through fear and violence. Even if it meant having to sacrifice their own life, humans could rally their courage to fight to protect someone they loved. This was why humans had their Heroes who represented that courage and their Saints who represented that love.
“The Saint.”
The golden girl the humans were trying to save. The purehearted maiden who was more beautiful than any girl should have been at her age. Who had seen through Caudle’s true identity with her keen eye—and despite knowing what he was, she had smiled at him affectionately. If she were to meet the compassionate Daemon King, perhaps she would be willing to save him too. Not that he hoped to be granted such a wish after plotting to sacrifice her to end the world for the sake of his kind, but Caudle couldn’t help but wish she would save him.
Caudle was using the humans, pretending to be part of a united front so that this monster wouldn’t reach the Daemon King. However, hisfeelings about everything had changed. It was as if by coming into contact with her purity, he too had been slightly purified. He now wielded his blade, putting his life on the line not only for the Daemon King, but for the Saint as well—to save that little girl.
Ẃ е́ b̃n о̄v̄еl̈ _Еṅ ŭm̊ а
“Daemon King, please forgive me.” Caudle knew he was likely to die here. Knowing that the Daemon King may mourn for him, but surely not rebuke him, Caudle readied his demonic blade again as he leaped back into the fray.
“Damn it!” Ludoric panicked. Yulucia had been absorbed by that monster and it felt like it was taking so long to get her back, but he was overwhelmingly frustrated with himself for being so useless on this battlefield.
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Everyone always told Ludoric how competent he was, but they meant that he was competent for a twelve-year-old boy.
He was as good a swordsman as a knight, but not as good as the paladins.
He could use spellcraft just as well as anyone else, but he couldn’t match Noel, who had been working as a mercenary for several years now.
The attendants who had Yulucia’s blessing must have poured their blood and sweat into getting strong enough to be the Saint’s attendants. He couldn’t match any of them in their protection of others, wisdom for how to save their mistress, or their ability to make that happen.
Ẁ_е̄ bn o v̀ ѐl Ѐǹ.u̇ m̆а̇
Ludoric was inferior to everyone here.
As the person with the highest social status, he was in charge, but everyone knew their roles so well that there was no need for him to give orders.
What am I even doing? Ludoric clenched his fist at his own powerlessness.
He had come on this trip in order to protect Yulucia. Some had criticized the prince’s plan out of concern, but he pushed to travel with her anyway because he knew that he was only the backup heir. If something happened to Ludoric, there was always his older brother Timoté.
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That wasn’t a good reason for putting himself in danger, but Ludoric knew that there was a faction that supported his claim to the throne over his brother’s. There were times when he even thought that the kingdom would be better off without him.
He understood very well why the battle of succession had made Yulucia’s father try to leave the royal family. At the same time, he sympathized with the feelings of being unable to sever his familial ties.
Ẇ.ӗ b̂n̆ ov̈ e l Е̇ num а
“Yulucia!”
They could be overly indulgent at times, but he loved his family. And for the sake of his family, he would do whatever it took to rescue Yulucia. She was his family too—like a little sister, even.
But he hadn’t felt that way about her at first.
The first time he met her, Ludoric had been seven years old. She had such doll-like beauty, yet such humanlike flaws, and he couldn’t help but be enchanted by how pretty she was.
During the kidnapping, he had been powerless while she managed to heal not only the bodies of those children, but their hearts as well, even though she wasn’t even four years old yet. And Ludoric adored her for it.
She was the true Saint. People respected Ludoric since he was a prince, but he was sure that even if she weren’t a princess, the entire Holy Kingdom would still respect and revere Yulucia.
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If only she weren’t a princess. If she weren’t descended from royal blood, then Ludoric could have loved her without any obstacles. But she was royalty and the Saint, and to marry her would be synonymous with becoming king.
Since Timoté was so much older, he only saw Yulucia as a little sister. Therefore, Ludoric had no choice but to be her older brother too.
That was why Ludoric had struggled so hard to become more mature. He tried to grow up not just physically, but mentally so that he could be more rational. Ludoric grew up to be the kind of big brother who could protect his little sister—or at least, he had tried.
But now Yulucia’s life was in danger because of the evil designs of the daemons.
Why had he tried so hard to grow up? Why had he resolved to be like an older brother to her? Had everything he had done up until now all been for naught?
If he couldn’t save Yulucia, then lying to his heart would have just been a pointless waste of time.
W̃ е̂b ńӧv е̇l̀ E n u m̈ а̇
“Raaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”
In that moment he made up his mind to fight for the girl he loved, something took root in Ludoric’s heart.
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His body was enveloped in silver light as he received the blessing of Steel Heart, an earth arch elemental. Brimming with new energy, the boy bellowed toward the heavens.
“Lucia!” Noel continued putting his whole heart and soul into every swing of his sword. He never faltered or felt afraid, not even when he was injured or knocked off his feet. He continued driving forward and swinging the blade in his hand.
All for the sake of the girl he loved.
His whole family had been murdered when he was young. Noel had been abused, had lost all hope and given into despair, wishing for death until the tiny golden Saint had saved him.
Е̃ nü_m̃.а̃
Saint Yulucia. She declared that she would not allow him to resign himself to death, and the affectionate smile she showed him then made him feel as if he were seeing an angel sent by the gods.
Even when all was lost, there was always still hope. In teaching him that, Yulucia was like a goddess who had given light to the world—and he believed her to be the true Saint.
At first, he’d admired her. Just as people clung to religion when they felt hopeless, he’d relied on the Saint’s existence for emotional support as he desperately continued to live. His talents were recognized and it ultimately led him to his adoptive father. The boy who had once been the son of refugees now lived among the nobility.
He had been able to make graves for his family and spoke to them, telling them that he was living a good life now. At long last, he felt as if he were human.
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That young boy who had been content just admiring the girl slowly grew up, and became keenly aware of the differences between him and her: He was the adopted son of middle nobility with no territory to call his own, while she was the Princess of the Holy Kingdom and the true Saint. There was a wall as high as a mountain range between them.
He had been so happy when he got to see her again. But as they got older, it was becoming harder to talk to her on the same level.
Е n ü m̈ ӓ
Meeting Yulucia had given him the hope to go on living again in a time when Noel had lost everything, and he had slowly grown the circle of people he cared about through his adoptive father, allies, and friends. Each time he added more people to that circle, they became bonds of obligation that pulled him even further away from her.
She had always treated him the same, as if nothing had changed. She still smiled at him just like she had when they were younger, but her smile was even more beautiful now that they were older.
And now Yulucia was lost inside of this monster with extraordinary strength.
The attendants said that they would be able to extract Yulucia from the beast if they kept attacking. Surely her attendants wanted to save their mistress too if they could. They themselves couldn’t all keep fighting the beast, despite their strength, because the Saint had trained them in a kind of spellcraft that only they could use to save her.
They believed in Noel, so that was why they entrusted this task to him.
Though he was trying his best, he had been unable to land a blow that gave them the chance to pull her out.
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“Why?!”
Why couldn’t he do that attack he had used way back when?
Yulucia had gone to a provincial city in Toure to visit the injured and sick, and she had been kidnapped. Noel had managed to turn the feelings welling up inside of him into light to slay the lycanthropes.
He just couldn’t draw out that attack—that light—again. He could make light by reciting a spell. However, he had not managed to perform that explosive attack a second time.
What had been different about that moment? Was it because he had received Yulucia’s blessings? Or had he been wrong and that attack had never actually been his own power?
“Oh, so that’s it.”
W̆ е b́n оv̆ еl Е̃ ñ u m а
His heart filled with despair at his inability to save Yulucia. Although he’d felt the same way back then, he had felt the light of courage inside his heart.
If he couldn’t use the light, then there was something else he could use instead. Which was—
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“My life!”
He didn’t need protection. He didn’t want to keep on living if she wasn’t part of his life. He had to do the same thing he had done the last time he’d needed to rescue her: throw his entire being into a single attack, using his own life as a weapon.
If it could save the Saint he so admired—no, that wasn’t right.
If it could save the girl he loved, then Noel would willingly sacrifice his own life.
Е ñ úm̃ а̊
And that determination summoned the light again.
Noel gasped.
It hadn’t disappeared. The light had always been inside of him. He just hadn’t been able to see it. He could feel the light elemental inside his heart.
The legends of the Holy Kingdom said that when a great evil appeared, the light elemental would choose a Hero to save the world. Having received the light elemental’s protection, Noel then awoke as the one and only true Hero of this world. He shouted the feelings of his heart for the girl he loved: “†§† (Light)!”
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A great pillar of white light erupted from his blade as he swung down at the Golden Beast, his light clashing with the Golden Beast’s strength.
“Raaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” At the same time, Ludoric struck on the opposite side, his sword shining with silver light. “Noel!”
W̆ ӗ ḃṅ о̆ v̇е̌l Ё n úm̀ӓ
“Ludoric!”
The two called one another’s names, nodded in unison, and then drove their lights into the Golden Beast even further. Until that moment, the Golden Beast had been unperturbed, but now she was finally knocked back.
“Now!” At Noah’s cry, all four attendants rushed after her and used their magic to activate the magic circle.
Roaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar!
It didn’t stop the Golden Beast, though, and she fired off a pulse of energy from her mouth aimed at the four of them. Even the four attendants wouldn’t be able to withstand the attack without some kind of defense.
“Noooooo!” Caudle leaped in, using his demonic blade and body as a shield against the shock waves. He gave a slightly chagrined look to the long-awaited Hero, who looked shocked now. “Do it, Heroes! Save the Saint!”
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That was when the magic circle enveloped the Golden Beast in red light and a golden light shot out from within her.
“Yulucia!”
“Luciaaa!”
The light was as blindingly bright as the sun. It was impossible for the boys to see what was happening.
Had the magic circle worked? Was Yulucia okay? The boys screamed out from their hearts and light scattered about like golden feathers in answer.
“Ahhh.”
W̆е̃b nо ṽ ӗ l̆ Ẽ ñ ûmа
The form of a girl emerged from the light. Her tattered dress fluttered about her like wings as the unconscious Yulucia glided down like an angel, returning to the people who loved her.
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